I already stop drinking fluids at 3pm.
Donāt know your age but Iām slowly (maybe not so slowly) towards 60 and if I donāt drink anything past dinner time, I usually sleep till morning without waking up at all during the night.
If I remember correctly you are fitness NUT doing a lot of exercise and Iām afraid you waking up at 2AM is your body saying to you, hey dude give it some rest because you are taxing me immensely, 1/2 of what you do is plenty. Just a thought!
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If you wake at 2-3am then the likelihood is you have a sleep cycle which has gone into CAR at that point. You probably need to wait a bit. It depends on what options you have with melatonin, but if you have 5/10/12 mg pills start taking them 45 minutes after waking every 10-15 minutes and with a bit of luck you will catch the next sleep cycle. You can read/look at your phone etc (ideally with orange glasses) for the first 45 mins (if this is the end of a sleep/HPA cycle). After that best to aim to sleep.
For me this delivers enough sleep so that I am not tired until I go to bed the next day.
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Iām just guessing youāve already tried an extended release formula? I use pure encapsulations melatonin SR. Natrol make an exteded release formula as well. I take it right before going to bed. It has helped me sleep through the night. I also recently discovered my TMG was interfering with sleep. I was waking up way too early. I stopped taking it before bed a few weeks ago. It took a few days but it helped immensely. I would like to add it back. I might try taking it in the morning to see if I can take it without interfering with sleep.
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Yes, I take a time release melatonin. I also take TMG in the morning. How did you determine TMG was bothering your sleep?
Its something to consider. I am not working very hard anymore but still perhaps too hard.
Help me with the ākeep taking doses to catch the right timeāā¦why not just wait until sleepy after taking melatonin when I wake up?
Iāve been taking most of my supplements for quite some time with the exception of NMN and TMG. I take NMN in the morning, was taking TMG before bed. It didnāt happen right away but after about a month I started noticing I was waking up before my alarm clock (set for 5:30am). I was waking up between 4:30-5:00 (to pee) and couldnāt get back to sleep. Whoop app sleep scores were starting to decline. Even on days off when I would stay up late the evening before I could not sleep in. This is unusual for me. I started taking apigenin before bed since it was something I was interested in anyway. It didnāt help. I wasnāt stressed about anything. Couldnāt understand what was going on. I started looking at my stack wondering if something was causing the problem. I knew TMG was one of the most recent changes to my stack. I did a little more research and found it can cause problems with sleep. I quit taking it. It took about 3-4 days not taking it before I started staying asleep until my alarm clock goes off. I still wake up to pee but go right back to sleep after. Last weekend I slept two days in a row until 7:30-8:00 on my days off. Iāve considered taking TMG in the morning but Iām a little scared to. I might try that but a lower dose. I was taking 1gm before.
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Now Iām wondering about TMG. Thanks for the tip.
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Melatonin has a short half life and a reduction in melatonin serum levels can cause an ultradian cycle (the HPA cycles last around 90 mins) to switch from parasympathetic to sympathetic. Hence if you get the timing wrong you wont be sleepy.
I suppose you mean that the 90 minute cycle caused by low melatonin cannot be stopped by adding melatonin. So if I take melatonin at the beginning of the cycle (90 minutes long), the melatonin will have started to fade by the end of the cycle, perhaps starting a new cycle of alertness. Did I understand you?
In essence I think you have it. Some time around the start of a new cycle. I think it is probably once the cycle has actually started, but it is after people wake, the body decides whether to go into sympathetic or parasympathetic state. Sympathetic is associated with the CAR (Cortisol Awakening response).
The decision is based upon the movement in serum melatonin. If it is constant or increasing then the body goes for para and if reducing (or has reduced) it goes for sympathetic.
Hence if you take melatonin after the start of the cycle and donāt top it up the level of melatonin will be on a downward curve at the end of that cycle and the next cycle will start with the CAR. However, if you take melatonin gradually and consistently either by sucking a tablet or taking tablets every so often then you can go into the new cycle with a non-reducing level of melatonin and get back to sleep.
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If you have to get up to use the bathroom, try keeping one eye closed all the time. It might keep one half of your brain in sleep mode that might dominate when you get back into bed allowing you to nod off again straight away.
(Incidentally, having a chicory root drink (high inositol) and multi B vitamin supplements causes me to need a nighttime toilet visit. Have cut both out and not had to get up since).
You shouldnāt worry about waking up in general with the 90 minute sleep cycle as itās a natural thing to do. Just roll over and start thinking of something pleasant like where could I go on next vacation and you should just drift off again.
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I have dim red lights on in the bathroom; I donāt turn on any lights. Inositol is something I take before bed (thanks Huberman); Iāll stop that to see effect. (Iām chopping my stack down big time anyway).
Usually I pee because Iām awake. I rarely wake up to pee.
The key for me is to get to sleep early enough that I wake up at 2am vs 4am. At 4am, plus time to fall back asleep, is too close to wake up time. I canāt shut my mind off.
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As a followup, I got 9 hours sleep last night with zero pee stops. I have started doing supplement / pharma fasts starting Friday night and lasting until Monday am. I do still take my rapa dose Sunday AM along with metformin but nothing else, not even any sleep aids. Last night I made a point to turn off the TV at 9pm, and read a real book (not electronic anything) until 930 when I feel asleep fairly quickly despite no chemicals. I was dehydrated, I think, due to a 90 minute sweaty bike ride in the afternoon after which I did not drink fluid. I think Iām onto something with the book reading (and no electronics).
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